


Walking on Air

by Morbane



Category: Black Swan (2010)
Genre: Body Horror, Constructive Criticism Welcome, Gen, Magic Realism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-13
Updated: 2013-01-13
Packaged: 2017-11-25 07:22:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 360
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/636498
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Morbane/pseuds/Morbane
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She sweeps the floor with feathers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Walking on Air

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Shusu (Sameshima_Shuzumi)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sameshima_Shuzumi/gifts).



She feels the feathers first when she rises up into _eleves_ , standing at the barre, because as she lifts up she sees Lily out the door, walking away down the hallway, the last to leave her here. Lily is all hips and wild hair let down for the day. How easily she leaves the studio behind. Nina feels a stab of anger. And a swish of feathers.

In the mirror, the space between her heels and the floor is precise – and empty. But she swivels on the ball of her left foot and feels a gentle sweep. (Of easy wind and downy flake… The down at her heels tickles, disturbed.)

She glides her right foot through a _ronde de jambe_ two inches above the floor, as though stroking the polished plane with invisible feathers, as though skimming the surface of a lake. 

Returning to the fifth position is more difficult.

The feathers bend and crackle, snapping brutally, the points twisting in her soles. She moans and buckles, settling her heels awkwardly, then rising _en pointe_ slowly, so slowly, as if to straighten the feathers as she lifts. There… and no matter how far she rises, they still reach the floor. She feels their delicate extension. They push out, and out, as she pushes away from the ground.

She kicks _à la seconde_ , and sees – the afterimage of a nonexistent flash – alulars, tertiaries, primaries snap out, as though she could strike a hole in the mirrors of the opposite wall.

This, then, is how it feels to be lifted by wings. Walking on nails and on air.

The image of nails solves her thought for her. They push out into the world, but she will push back. Her face is rigid as she lowers the kicking foot straight down. Feels the shafts push through her heel, her ankle, a hundred awls stabbing upwards towards her knees, held stiff in agony. So tight that only a drop of blood leaks from her heel, dark as tattoo ink. She holds a million needles in her heels, but if she holds them in this way, they will be ready. For when she spins again.

**Author's Note:**

> Forgive the amateurish ballet terminology! An unbeta'd snippet.


End file.
